Toshiba plans to divest nand production

Toshiba considers splitting its memory business into a separate company. The company has confirmed that. According to rumors, the Japanese giant would like to compensate for major financial setbacks with this.

Toshiba has admitted that it is considering splitting its memory division into a separate branch, following earlier rumors published by Japanese magazine Nikkei. The magazine believes that Toshiba wants to compensate for setbacks in the nuclear energy branch with the sale of the memory branch. In 2015, the company acquired an American company that specializes in building nuclear power plants. However, that company is beset by setbacks. Toshiba previously announced that this could lead to a loss of 500 billion yen, converted more than 4 billion euros.

Due to the large loss and the resulting depreciation of the company’s stock, it would consider all options for raising additional funds. Nikkei writes that Toshiba would continue to own the divisional memory business, but would like to sell about 20 percent of it to another company, such as Western Digital. This would involve an amount of between 200 and 300 billion yen, which is converted approximately between 1.5 and 2.5 billion euros.

Toshiba and Western Digital already have ties between them, which started after WD acquired Sandisk last year. Sandisk and Toshiba have worked together for years in the production of flash memory.